The Offseason
by Snowfallxo
Summary: JONAS. In which the ever-loyal Yankees fan Nick Lucas confronts Red Sox Nation during an Administration concert and maybe falls in love with a Sox fan - his best friend Macy. Nacy oneshot.


**A/N: This randomly popped into my head while re-watching all my concert videos... I'd like to think that Macy has different views on sports than the boys.**

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Amid all the girls, Macy stared at her best friend and (almost?) boyfriend onstage, mouth agape. His curly hair was perfectly splayed about in such a way that made her want to love him, but what he was saying was just absolutely wrong. Of course, Nick didn't know she'd flown out to her home city to see him and the Administration again in concert. He'd thought backstage passes was enough to keep her happy. And it had been, it had been perfect. Now Macy was wishing she never came.

She couldn't stand to see him there, talking like he thought nothing was wrong with what he was saying. He should know that something was wrong. It would only happen in Boston, that was for sure.

In seventh grade, Macy had moved with her family from Brookline, Massachusetts to Wyckoff, New Jersey. She remembered it vividly, her best friend Lucy's goodbye present - tickets to see the Cheetah Girls and Aly and AJ in concert. That was the day that she first learned of JONAS, the day where she first saw the wonderfulness of those boys. Best opening act ever - although the fact that Travis Clark had come onstage with Diane Birch for the opening act tonight was pretty cool, too. Macy was very much tempted to call Nick and tell him that she was here, but Lucy didn't actually know that she knew JONAS. She hadn't told any of her friends, actually. She'd done a great job of acting surprised when Lucy had told her that she had gotten tickets to see Nick. Maybe it was because she actually was surprised.

Just seconds before what Macy was now calling "the incident", Nick was onstage, in all his brown-eyed glory, talking about himself. And how much the fans knew about him. Small things, like when his birthday was (September 16th) or what his cell phone carrier was (Verizon). And then he did something he really should have never done.

He brought up the subject of baseball. His favorite baseball team.

With her new friends in New Jersey, Macy avoided the question about her favorite baseball team like the plague. If it was asked, she would quite simply say "Road Dogs" and change the subject. No one would argue with her, say that they were a softball team. It was such a typical, JONAS-head response that no one thought much of it.

In Massachusetts, however, Macy would change her answer. Her favorite baseball team was the Boston Red Sox, and that was that. Her favorite player was Jacoby Ellsbury, the center fielder. In her lifetime, she'd been to more Sox games at Fenway than JONAS concerts.

So when Nick said that his favorite baseball team was the New York Yankees, the fact that the Orpheum Theater stopped screaming and erupted into boos shouldn't have surprised her. But he was her friend now, and somehow, after living deep in Yankees territory for four years, she began to feel bad for him. Had Nick Lucas ever been booed in his life? Unlikely. She couldn't bring herself to do it herself, and really, how could anyone boo his perfect hair and shining, forgiving eyes?

But he was in Red Sox Nation now. Did Nick know what he was doing, going up there and flat-out admitting he was a Yankees fan in the middle of Boston? Macy wanted to call him later and yell at him in a playful way, but there were two things wrong with that.

One, he didn't know that she was here. And two, he didn't know that she was a Red Sox fan. And those were two things he really didn't need to know.

"Oh my gosh, Macy, what is he thinking?" Lucy squealed. That's when Macy noticed that a girl in the row in front of her had a navy blue shirt balled up in her hand. She knew the color, it was a color that she remembered Joe swearing never to wear.

"Even Nick can be stupid sometimes," Macy said, although it was partially a lie. Nick was almost never stupid, up until now, anyway. She'd like to see him try and beat the Red Sox in a game of baseball. Even if he did someday play shortstop for the Yankees, he would still crash and burn. Hopefully.

Macy was surprised at her own thoughts. She didn't really want Nick to crash and burn. She still loved him, no matter what sports team he liked.

The girl in front of her threw the shirt onstage. It landed at Nick's feet. He eyed it for a second, then leaned down to pick it up. Unwrapping it, he studied it for a minute, then said, "I'm going to turn this around really quickly so no one can take a picture." He did just that, but the whole audience saw the word "Boston" emblazoned on the front. More screaming erupted from the crowd.

"If I knew him, I'd make him wear it everyday," Lucy said proudly. Macy looked away from her friend, hoping she wouldn't catch the lie that flickered in her eyes.

Nick was still smiling up onstage, holding the shirt all balled up in his sweaty palms. "I'd like to invite our tour director Rob Brenner to the stage," he announced, and a man came in from the side. "He's a Red Sox fan, like John Fields here." More screaming. The one regrettable thing about any Lucas boy performing. "And I'm going to do something I thought I would never do."

Rob had a camera in his hand, and very slowly, Nick turned the shirt around and smiled a funny little smile for the camera. Even Macy couldn't resist screaming.

Someone else, maybe the same girl, threw a foam finger on the stage. Nick put the t-shirt down on his table, holding it with two fingers, and picked up the finger, showing that off to the audience. After briefly trying to attach it to the top of his guitar, he used it to pick his nose. The audience's reaction was a mix of laughs and boos.

As Nick set the finger down, he looked right out into the audience, right in front of him. Macy swore, for a second, he lay his eyes on her. Embarrassed, she looked away, hoping he hadn't seen her or recognized her. As he started to play Tonight, she straightened her self up and sang along with crowd, savoring every word.

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It was twenty minutes later, and ears ringing, Macy and Lucy tried to make their way out. "Oh my gosh, that was amazing!" Lucy squealed.

"Of course!" Macy replied. "It's Nick, what else did you expect from him? It was better than the New York concert, for sure."

Lucy stared at her, and Macy realized her mistake. "You went in New York, too?"

"Um, yeah, some of my new friends all went." Yeah, "new friends" being Joe and Kevin Lucas and Stella Malone, not to mention Fred and some of the other JONAS-heads. Suddenly, Macy felt a vibrating sensation in her pocket. Her cell phone. "Hold on a sec, I'm getting a call." She pressed talk. "Hello?"

"Hey, fangirl." The voice on the other end was so familiar, and Macy cursed herself for not looking at the caller ID. If she had known it was Nick, she wouldn't have picked up. "So I saw you in the audience tonight..."

"Yeah. Wanted to surprise you," she lied. Lucy read her face and gave her a look. Macy returned the look right back.

"Well, you did a great job." She could imagine his face, sweaty curls and pretty eyes. "Did you like the concert?"

"Yeah. You were great." She kept her voice flat as Lucy's expression turned from questioning to quizzical. "Hey, can I call you back? I'm with a friend."

"Sure," he said. "I'll be up. Twitter-spree."

"You enjoy that," she replied, and hung up.

"Who was that?" Lucy asked as soon as she ended her call.

Macy looked at the ground. "A friend of mine from Jersey." She said nothing more. "He wanted to say hi, that's all."

"He? You didn't tell me you had a boyfriend." She grasped Macy's shoulders. "Tell me all about him! What's his name, where's he from? Is he cute?"

"He's not my boyfriend." She pushed "Stay" out of my mind. They weren't technically together, it was just that they spent a lot of time... together and both really liked each other and Nick wrote a beautiful song about her and it made both of them cry...

Yeah, he was her boyfriend. And she felt horrible denying it.

"Yeah, sure, he's not your boyfriend. I suppose you're just like Joe and Stella, denying the fact that they love each other even though the whole fandom knows that they've got crushes on each other." Macy was getting a little annoyed at all the JONAS references. Had knowing the boys mellowed out her obsession that much?

"No, nothing like that," she said quickly. "We just haven't gotten around to a real relationship yet. He's really busy."

"So what's his name?"

Macy dodged the question, and pretended to be interested in the pretzel machine when she saw a very sketchy-looking figure in dark sunglasses and... a Boston Red Sox shirt? She knew this was him, there was no doubting it. Did he want to suffer death by fangirl?

She slipped away from Lucy and into the crowd. "Nick!" she whispered, stopping him from going any further. He took off his sunglasses and looked right into her eyes. She couldn't speak after he gave her that look... "Nice shirt" was all she was able to get out.

"Ew, it's gross," he said, making a face. "It's my disguise. I can't wait to take it off."

"And burn it?" In spite of everything, I smiled.

"Yeah." He looked at her again. "You want to help?"

Macy shuddered against his chest. That was sacrilegious. Heck, falling in love with a Yankees fan was being sacrilegious. But how could you help it, when this particular Yankees fan had pretty eyes and a beautiful voice? You couldn't. He was so seductive...

"Macy!" she heard Lucy say, and soon her friend was by her side. "Who's this?"

Frantically, Macy pushed the sunglasses back on Nick's face. He was momentarily confused, but didn't say anything. "Um, my friend," she said.

"The one you were just telling me about?" Macy nodded weakly. "Oh, cool. Hi, I'm Lucy." She held out her hand.

"Nick." He shook it, looking at Macy from behind his glasses. Lucy scanned him over, especially looking at the shirt. He looked at it with disgust. "Can I talk with Macy for a moment?" he asked. Lucy nodded, and Nick made his way through the crowd over towards the men's bathroom.

"So you've got friends here?" he asked.

"Yeah. I used to live here." She blushed softly. "Lucy invited me back for the weekend, I missed school today and I'll miss it again tomorrow, and she surprised me with tickets." Leaning against the wall, she continued, "You know, she took me to my first JONAS concert."

"Then I suppose you owe her a lot," he remarked.

She smiled. "Yeah, I suppose I do."

He smiled back and took off the glasses and the shirt. A couple of girls walking by stared at him, but he pretended not to notice. "Go bring her over here and really introduce her to me." He pushed the shirt into her hands. "And get rid of that, please."

Macy looked at the shirt she held, and clutched it close to her. "Okay," she whispered, and ran off to go find Lucy.

"Lucy," she said, towing her over. "I'd like you to meet my friend Nick Lucas."

Lucy's mouth dropped open in surprise. "You mean..." Her eyes grew round.

"Yeah," Macy said sheepishly. "I met them when I moved to New Jersey. They go to my school."

"So he's your boyfriend?"

"I'm not her boyfriend," Nick said.

"He's not my boyfriend," Macy echoed.

Lucy looked from her friend to her idol and back again and smiled. "I'll give you guys a couple more minutes," she said, and skipped off to go to somewhere, leaving Nick and Macy alone.

Macy squeezed the shirt in her hand. "I'm sorry about my friend, she's a little..."

"I like her," Nick remarked, cutting her off. "So, Macy, why didn't you tell me you were coming tonight?"

"Because," she said softly. "The only person who knows that I moved from here is Stella. And now you. And there's just one thing that the whole school would murder me for if they knew..."

Nick looked surprised. "And that is...?"

"I'm a Red Sox fan." Macy blushed furiously and unraveled the shirt. "That's why I refused to go with you to any baseball games last summer. I don't actually play whatever sport I told you I did."

"Curling," he said, grinning. "Which makes sense, you play curling on ice."

"Right." She blushed even harder.

Nick brushed her hair out of her eyes. "Macy, I don't mind that you're a Sox fan. I mean, the whole theater booed me, right?"

"Yeah. They did." She threw the shirt at his face. He caught it. "I believe this is yours?"

"Sadly." He slipped it back on over his head and Macy took out a silver pen from her purse. Grinning, she wrote in big block letters on his back "N. Lucas". "There. Now it really is your shirt."

"Nice touch," he said sarcastically, and pulled her close. And even with a small crowd of onlooking girls watching, he leaned down and kissed her, the Yankees fan and the Red Sox fan.

And Macy just didn't care about baseball anymore. Love just seemed more important. After she pulled away, Nick whispered in her ear, "We don't have time to waste, Macy Misa. Just tell me that you'll stay."

"I'll stay, Nick Lucas," she replied softly. "I'll stay."

And they kissed once more.

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May 17th, 2010, and Macy couldn't recall a time she had felt happier.

"Hey, fangirl," Nick called to her in the hall.

"What's up, singer-boy?" she asked teasingly.

He rummaged around in his bag and pulled out a pair of pasteboard strips. "How 'bout them Yanks?" he asked, grinning.

"No thanks, Nicholas," she said. "You know how I feel."

He shook his head. "This is different." He gave her one of the tickets. "Sox versus Yanks. Boston at New York. We'll just be that couple that's very good at arguing."

Macy looked up into Nick's eyes. "Well then. I believe we have a date." She turned to walk away, then added as a last thought: "Bring your Sox shirt." Something told her...

Oh, and the Sox won. 12-2. But Nick didn't seem to care - as long as he had Macy and Macy had him, he had won as well. And besides, Nick thought with a grin, what did it matter if the Sox won if the Yankees were going to win tomorrow?

As for Macy, everything seemed pretty darn perfect to her. With the Sox on top of the league and her on top of the world, nothing could bring her down.

"Nick," she whispered softly in his ear during the ninth inning. "We don't have time to waste, just tell me that you'll stay..."

"I'll stay, Macy," he whispered, and kissed her once more.

Later they would learn that ESPN had shot footage of their kiss, and to Nick's dismay - Joe and Kevin had taped the game.

Some things would never change, their views on sports teams among them.

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**A/N: So I suppose you noticed all the creative liberties I took. Haha. I'd like to think that Macy's a Red Sox fan, that Nick wrote "Stay" about her, that she did move from Massachusetts, my sweet home state... well, anyway, I hope you enjoyed this happy piece of fluff. For me, that's probably about as happy as it will get. I like my angst and fantasy stuff better. Anyway, please review! :) cookies and red socks for all who do...**

**UPDATE (8/23/10): Okay, so I've noticed I've been getting a lot of favorites on this story lately (and a couple reviews, thanks a ton to those who write 'em, 'cause I read 'em and they make me happy), and I'm just wondering one simple little thing: where, exactly, have you found this story that was written back in January? It has to be BURIED in the fanfiction archive by now. So if someone would please, please tell me where exactly you've been coming from (and please, do keep coming - it's not like I'm protesting) so I can go say thank you. Because, well, it bugs me. And to all those who like it - do remember the (totally un-updated) sequel, "Sweet Caroline". kthanks. :D**


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